Life's purpose is to serve humanity.

I've reached a point where I ask myself what truly makes me happy, motivated and inspired to move with passion. I have researched this and tried to be in tune with the universe to more so understand. I also believe we were given special gifts to help fulfill our purpose. TED videos have come into play and helped shaped my proposal along with other great books.

Apr 21 2013:
The world is sick. If we look at history, the cure is there: kindess and nonviolence. They always work. Victories won by any other means are impermanent. I believe the ultimate aim of life is to serve Nature and -- like you said -- humanity.

Apr 24 2013:
I'm not entirely sure how you mean "to serve humanity". There are so many ways one could serve others.
I think one of the best ways I could serve humanity would be to separate myself from the physical world, to take a step back away from the role of Leader and Follower and become a third option, an Observer. To see things as they are without opinion or emotion
To think about the universe and our place in it, contemplation on "the questions" to invent new questions and put them into the world. Above all, to give people purpose. Purpose can be a large part to the key of happiness and empowerment. However this is a vast topic, as vast as vast could be, to expect the answers to come from one person would be inconceivable, it's something everyone has to do for everyone.

Apr 22 2013:
Honestly at this point in time, I cant really say I know what the purpose of life is, the purpose of humanity is, or my own purpose for that matter. Only time will tell and hopefully we find our anwsers someday, if possible

Apr 24 2013:
Margaret Elizabeth Noble was born on 28 October 1867 in the town of Dungannon in County Tyrone, Ireland to Mary Isabel (mother) and Samuel Richmond Noble (father) and was named for her paternal grandfather, Hamilton. The Nobles were of Scottish descent, settled in Ireland for about five centuries. Her father, who was a priest, gave the valuable lesson that service to mankind is the true service to God. When Margaret was one year old Samuel moved to Manchester, England and there he enrolled as a theological student of the Wesleyan Church. Young Margaret at this time stayed with her maternal grandfather Hamilton in Northern Ireland. When she was four years old she returned to live with her father.
Samuel died in 1877 when she was only ten years old. Then Margaret was brought up by her maternal grandfather. Hamilton was one of the first-ranking leaders of the freedom movement of Ireland.Margaret got her education from Church boarding school in London. She and her sister attended Halifax College, run by a member of Congregationalist Church. The headmistress of this college taught her about personal sacrifice. She extensively studied various subjects, including physics, arts, music, literature. She embraced teaching at the age of seventeen. She first worked in Keswick as a teacher of children. Subsequently she established a school in Wimbledon and followed her own unique methods of teaching. She was also a prolific writer and wrote in the paper and periodicals. In this way she soon became a known name among the intellectuals of London. She was engaged to be married to a Welsh youth who died soon after engagement.The regulated religious life could not give her the necessary peace and she began to study various books on religion.
Margaret came to India, became disciple of Vivekananda and dedicated her life for Indian people as Sister Nivedita.
Her epitaph in Darjeeling reads : "Here reposes Sister Nivedita who gave her all to India".
I think I agree with you.

Apr 22 2013:
Julia I love your approach to life. Anything a person does becomes a much bigger and phenomenal thing if there is a use or purpose served.

One quote I often bring up in this regard is this one, ""We are not born for the sake of ourselves, we are born for the sake of others." ~ E. Swedenborg.

If there is anything, any item, in the house we regard as having no purpose, it goes in the trash. Which, I think, is not an unusual mind-set.

Many people go to, sometimes far away, places 'to find themselves.' That might be the opportunity to search for one's gifts.
I believe we are in this life to shape and develop our eternity. Just as our body is in the womb to grow and develop for this life. In human life there are many parallels between individuals and mankind. Growing and developing is one of them.

Apr 22 2013:
As with many other questions, anwsering one means asking and anwsering others. So what is life's purpose? Well that would depend on some factors. If one believes in evolution, adaptions, and the passing down of genes to better and prolong your species then a simple anwser of our purpose is to survive, and pass on our genes to the next generation. However we as some other species on Earth are classified as "grandmother" species, meaning that we have a life after that of our ability to pass on our genes and strive in our environment dimishes. If our purpose was strictly to ensure the survival of the next generation of our species the average life span would end somewhere between 47-57 years old, when we lose our reproductive abilities and are past our prime. Yet this is not the case, we live longer, and can even make the arguement that to a point we are still getting better up in to our elder ages! So maybe there isnt just one anwswer, maybe we should be asking the purpose of life segmented into different categories of life. Some species actually simply live just for a period of time until they reproduce (certain insects only have a 24 hr life span, some species die after giving birth, others may eat their mate for a meal after reproduction) And their purpose may be just that, pass on their genes and they are in the clear, ours may be something more, we are so advanced we cant just simply pass on our genes and expect the slow mutations of evolution to exponentially make us better, we must go further and help develop our culture and technologies and share our knwledge and wisdom with younger generations. Yet it may not just revolve around your species surviving, again in higher forms and more advanced species we have things called feelings. Would one purpose of life not be to live happily? That opens up a whole other discussion about what happiness is. Then of course depending on your religious beliefs all these things could change, purpose could be to serve god